Thanks to everyone who came to Beeston Library for my “Virtual” Watson Fothergill Walk. I had some great feedback on the talk and I really enjoyed it. I hope I can do some more talks in this format as it’s a good way to experience part of the tour without the walking (and I get to wear a head-mic and pretend I’m a stand-up or Madonna… wish I had a photo!)

Beauty in the Details walk added, 9 December 2018.

A few folks on Facebook expressed an interest in a Sunday edition of the Beauty In The Details Lace Market Walk so I’ve added a date on 9 December 2018. The walk will be a short exploration of St Mary’s Gate starting at Debbie Bryan at 2pm. After a look around the area we will finish up at Debbie Bryan for a drink and a warm mince pie. Plus there’s 10% off other menu items in the tea room.

After a good look around in Sherwood, I went for a further wander and caught a bus to Carlton to see if I could find the Brewery at Mar Hill (A71). Away from the bus route, deep into Carlton, I found the building. It was originally built for Mr Vickers, in 1899. It was convereted to residential use around 2005.

Primrose Street side.From the other side, now a car park.

From what I can find online, the Carlton Brewery was a relatively short lived enterprised. The Vickers family held the licence at The Black’s Head pub close by in Carlton in the late 1800s.

“Brewing in Nottinghamshire” has an older picture of the building and states that the Carlton Brewery was short lived. With Mrs Vickers there in 1902 and Willam (her son?) there between 1904-1906. It was sold in 1904, 1906 and 1909. It became a laundry, then a print works and then it was used as a dye works owned by the Ilkeston Hosiery Finishing Company. The sequence of these changes is not entirely clear.

Along Primrose Street are also a series of 16 terraced houses built for brewery workers. It has been suggested that Fothergill also designed these but Darren Turner refutes this: The drawings survive in Nottinghamshire Archives but there is no stylistic evidence in the design, not documentary evidence on the surviving drawings to substansiate this rumour.

For more about buildings around Carlton, there is a U3A trail to follow, with some pictures of the other buildings.

Mar Hill Brewery now Sandpiper House, stair turret.From the other side, later period Fothergill details, heavily cleaned up in conversion.

The other industrial building of Fothergill’s that survives in Nottingham is down on Castle Boulevard. I was down that way a few weeks ago, but because of the road it’s quite tricky to photograph. The Paper Warehouse (A59), on what was then Lenton Boulevard was built for Simons and Pickard, in 1893-94, the date stone reads 1894.

The Paper Warehouse on Castle Boulevard.The date stone, 1894.Taken when the leaves were still on the trees, October 2018.Brick patterns and finials, very Fothergill. All photos by Lucy Brouwer.

The rear of the building is on the canal side and has a more conventional warehouse look. This was one of the buildings for which Fothergill commissioned photographs from Bedford Lemere, and some of these can be found on Historic England’s website. There is another photo, taken from above, attached to the listing.

My next walk will be a little look around the Lace Market on 7 December 2018. Tickets are available here on Eventbrite.

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Inside was rather busy and has been significantly altered, the two downstairs rooms were full of crafy goings on so a bit difficult to see, but apart from the windows there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of original features. The house has been significantly extended and converted so, as with so many of these buildings, it remains the exterior that retains its original character.

Heading back towards Sherwood shops, I took the chance to photograph the terrace of four, three-storey houses on the corner of Bingham Road (A77). These are virtually the last project that Fothergill put his name to before he retired. They were built in 1906 with Fothergill as the client as he had previously bought up the land (next to some earlier houses he built on Mansfield Road. A46)

The timber clad gables are quite different to the earlier houses and look at lot more like the work that assistant architect Lawrence George Summers would continute to work on after Fothergill had left the office (see his later work in New Basford which is erroneously credited to Fothergill on Picture The Past etc.)

Mansfield Road view of the 1906 houses.Bingham Road view of the 1906 houses. Date carved into frame above doors. Now converted into flats.

Back in Sherwood, I went down Burlington Road to look for some slightly elusive, domestic Fothergills. This part of Nottingham is refered to as Cavendish Hill in the planning applications. The earlier Elberton House (A53) was built for Mr Gallimore, a clerk to Smith and Co’s Bank in 1890. Fothergill had worked on a branch of the bank in Long Eaton in 1889. Additions were made to the villa dated 1911, and these are the last known (minor) works for a private client to be signed off under Fothergill’s own name.

Villa, Cavendish HillSide view of the Villa at Cavendish Hill

Close by is the Burlington Towers built in 1892 as a three-storey villa for Mr Lindley (A54) it has now been made into flats. UPDATE 18/11/18: I just received an email from the present owner of Burlington Towers, who has turned it back into one whole house. Apparently they were able to work from Fothergill’s drawings to get back to the original layout. There is a photo in the Bedford Lemere archive* from 1897 on Historic England’s website. (Elberton House also makes an appearance.)

*It turns out this is the tip of the iceberg in terms of period photos of Fothergill buildings on the Historic England site, I will keep digging for more, but so far Fothergill’s own family home at Mapperely Road and the Sherwood Rise properties have been identified.

I’m planning to do some more of my short walks in the Lace Market with Debbie Bryan in December. The walk takes place at 2pm on 7th December, with a look at the architecture and history of St Mary’s Gate. These tours will be similar to the Heritage Open Days tours that took place in September but this time will include tea or coffee and a warm mince pie at Debbie Bryan. You will also receive 10% off any other tea room orders on your visit.

Thanks to Katie at Debbie Bryan for the photo.

There will be a look at the Adams Building and other Thomas Chambers Hine work in the area, as well as Watson Fothergill’s Milbie House on Pilcher Gate. The whole thing should take around 45 minutes with time for tea and mince pies (and perhaps some creative Christmas Shopping) afterwards.

If this first one is popular we may add more dates in December.

Tickets are £10 each, available here from Debbie Bryan, or call into her shop on St Mary’s Gate.